They Had One Job
by 3cheersforidiots
Summary: Written for the Monthly OneShot Exchange,for Kyoki Kamanoke Shinigama (decided to make a standalone instead of a chap for my compliation) Summary: Somehow, after a duel with a former Death Eater, Harry, and his two partners for the mission find themselves in a strange, but familiar place. How did they get here, why, and what are they going to do now? Who knows. Well, maybe they do.


**A/N: So this one-shot is written for two challenges, the December One-Shot Exchange and the Ultimate Battle Competition 2. Prompts used for the One-Shot Exchange:**

 **Characters/pairings: Tonks/Harry**

 **Genres: Well… My three possible prompts were Romance, Time Travel and Action, and there's a bit of all three in it…**

 **Prompt: [word] Slytherin, [dialogue] „I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Draco."**

 **(Also, I watched Sherlock before I wrote like half of the story, so that might be a reason why it sounds like a freaking detective novel)**

 **Enjoi!**

 _-line break-_

"So... Just where are we exactly?" asked a very confused Harry Potter from no one in particular, even though two pairs of eyes were looking at him with various expressions.

One of these two people was Draco Malfoy, his former arch enemy, nowadays his not-quite-a-friend-yet stepbrother.

How, you may ask, but things happen to people in a war. After all, the blond was happy to have escaped Azkaban with Narcissa, though his father wasn't that lucky this time, and even if it wasn't for Harry's marriage, he would've tried to make amends, not only with the Golden Trio, but with possibly everyone. Which was of course impossible, but admitting the problem is the first step towards repair, after all.

And Harry understood. He wasn't the one to hold grudges, though he knew that he couldn't fully forgive, nor could he forget. But, just like the other, he tried, especially because Draco admittedly have had his eyes on the Little Survivor's best friend, ever since she and Ron decided that they were better off as just friends, which was a few months after the war. And it's been long years, even though he hasn't succeeded yet. Yet.

As for Harry, he didn't have much time after the Battle of Hogwarts. He was the most famous and wanted wizard in Britain, while he was still griefing, and on top of that, he had a godson to attend to. Tonks did survive, but she lost her husband, and she just couldn't bear with raising a kid alone, so - while at first, mostly just dutyfully - the jet black haired wizard helped her out, and eventually, their relationship grew into something more.

When they publicly announced that they were indeed an item, the reception wasn't flawless, but there was much less fuss about it than they perceived. And after the news died down, they were able to maintain a somewhat peaceful life - at least as peaceful as two auror's life could be. They even had a child, Remus Sirius, who was currently in his second year at Hogwarts.

But as boring as it sounds, at this particular moment, nothing was actually alright.

 _-line break-_

This whole ordeal our heroes found themselves in started just a few days prior, when the Auror Department got an alert from the Ministry of Magic in the United States, that they found traces of usage of forbidden magic, and that it might have been the doing of a former Death Eater, who deserted from Europe after the Second Wizarding War.

And of course, the Ministry decided that they wouldn't send just anybody who was up to the task, no, they would have somebody important. And there wasn't any better than Harry Potter himself, and his wife, Nymphadora Potter née Tonks.

Problem was, the two of them hardly knew anything about the whereabouts of this wizards, so they had to seek out some kind of help from anyone who _could_ help before they even started working on the case.

And, well, this one person turned out to be Draco Malfoy, which wasn't surprising at all, considering all his connections to the followers of the deceased Dark Lord, but you have to admit that Fate had a particular sense of humor this time.

And so, the three of them took an international portkey to Wichita, Kansas, where the criminal was last believed to be seen, and they began their hunt, which was partly successful, in the end.

At first, everything went slowly, they asked around, talked to anyone who might have seen him, but it wasn't really successful. So, Harry made the suggestion that they could use the same tactics he had before, when he was hunting down horcruxes with his two best friend.

Which practically meant that they apparated randomly at some point in the state, try to guess what the next location of their investigation would be of the clues they had, and so on, until they actually found the person they were looking for.

And once again, it worked out surprisingly well, and just after a couple of days of running around, the trio found an old shack with some hastily put up wards around it, which they could easily destroy anytime.

Inside though, they had to face the guy and two of his clones. Turned out, he's been experimenting with cloning for all the wrong reasons of course, thus the traces of forbidden magic he left after himself. And, he had reached quite some achievements with his research.

So, it was three for three, and the battle began. Jinxes, hexes, curses and countercurses were flying all over the place, causing not one window or glass vase to shatter into millions of pieces, and sometimes a curtain or other object of use to catch on fire, so much that not much time has passed before the duel had to be taken outside, leaving the flames behind.

Of course, all of them were trained witches and wizards, but the three aurors obviously had the advantage, because they were much more used to duelling, however it may be, so, though it took a while, they cornered the man and his clones.

Although they fought vehemently – just like they always did, when the occasion called for it -, what the trio didn't notice was that the Death Eater had saved some goods, in fact, each and every one of himself did, and their train of thoughts were quite the same too. They were clones, after all.

He knew that this battle was lost, but – as he thought – the war wasn't over. He thought maybe, just maybe, if he succeded in teleporting his enemies away, he could make a run for it, and escape somewhere else, just to prolong another fight to a later date, possibly and hopefully never. So, as quickly as he could, he cast the portkey charm to the first object he could find in his pockets, and sent it in the way of another curse he was almost hit with, and the spell hit it squarely. He had no knowledge of the why, but the spell seemed to connect with the object, which seemed to be some kind of a necklace, and then a moment later, he was all alone, with the little house still burning into ashes behind him.

Even if only for a moment, he felt proud of himself, as though he managed to buy himself time, so he was already thinking of the next place where he would hide.

Oh, how wrong he was. In fact, he was so wrong, he didn't notice the three figures behind him, with wands already out and pointing at him, not wasting any moment to stupefy him in a mere fraction of a second.

The next moment, he and his clones were out cold.

 _-line break-_

"Trust me, if I knew I would've told you already." replied the former Slytherin, after a quick glance at the trio's surroundings.

"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Draco." said Nmyphadora Tonks, still looking a bit worried as she looked over Harry once more.

"Well, no shit Sherlock. If you hadn't said it, I-..."

"I think I know this place." said Harry, not even making an effort to comment on the fact that Draco somehow knew of the Sherlock series, which was although famous, it was also muggle. while he dusted off his trousers. "Is it possible that we're in Borgin and Burke's? Draco? You should know it by heart."

"Don't remind me." said mentioned wizard with a grimace. "But yeah, it certainly looks like it. As for how we got here though? Don't ask me."

Harry fell deep into thought for a moment, when he realized he was holding something in his still dusty hands. He opened up his palms, and saw what seemed like a broken hourglass in it, with shards scattered all around in the sand that was flowing off between the man's fingers. With a jolt he realized just what he was clutching.

"Guys... I have a theory." He said, looking up at his partners. "Remember the thing we got portkeyed with?" The metamorphmagus and his cousin shook their respective heads. "Me neither, until now. I think it was a time turner."

"But weren't all time turners destroyed in the Battle of the Department of Mysteries, in your fifth year?" pointed out Tonks.

"You're not wrong, but I'm pretty sure even if Britain had every single time turner in existence, there's just no way in hell there wasn't someone who just happened to have stolen one. I even doubt that Hermione's one has been destroyed." At the mention of Potter's brainiac friend, Draco's head suddenly shot up.

"She had a time turner?" he inquired with unconcealed interest.

"Third year. She took up all possible classes, remember?" the Gryffindor answered, with Malfoy's facial expression once again turning back into a slight grimace.

"Yeah, I'll probably never forget that year. She had one heck of a nice hook." Noted the blonde.

"She still has. If I was you, I'd be afraid of her."

"I hate to break it to you two, but we still don't know how in Merlin's name we got here. And why. Harry, could you explain?" Tonks didn't sound angry at all, she just couldn't, even is she tried, so all the two man saw on her face was confusement and tiredness.

"Oh, that, right. As I said, this thing here has a high chance of being a former time turner, might even be a cursed one at that, considering we landed in Borgin and Burke's. And while it was a portkey, so we traveled in space, it also might have been that because it broke, the time magic and the transport magic fused, so, I cannot know for sure, but it's possible that we also went back in time." explained Harry.

"But how far?" wondered Tonks, who's been walking around in circles for the last few minutes.

"I have no clue. What I know is that a time turner works for going back for hours of time, but for all I know, it could have sent us back for years, though I doubt it. Hermione once researched time magic, and she said that if another kind of magic interferes with time turning, it can lower its effectiveness, or something like that." Harry contemplated.

"So you're saying that even if it's unlikely, we might be years from our present?" asked the other wizard with a doubtful expression.

"Yeah, techincally."

"It mustn't be that far back though. I've seen Knockturn Alley a few days ago, and this place looks just the way I last saw it." noted the metamorphmagus.

"True enough. But, what do we do now?"

" _Tempus_ " cantated Tonks. Some numbers showed up right in front of the trio, and they realized, somewhat relieved, but also somewhat worried, that it was just a couple of days before their fight in the shack. "Well, I guess it's not that bad then. But what do we do now?"

"Well, what I remember is that we have to try to not expose ourselves to anybody. We are believed to be on another continent, and it would mess the timeline up, that's what I know. But we also have to eat and sleep somewhere." the jet black haired wizard replied, frowning his eyebrows.

"Harry, do you think we could manage here?"

"Somehow, sure, I just haven't the faintest clue how, to be honest." he shrugged, with the kind of lost face which told his partners that he completely gave up.

"Well, my cousin here is a metamorphmagus, as you might have noticed. We are also wizards, and we all used to learn Transfiguration, so we would be able to be someone else if we need to." pointed out Draco.

"True enough. Then, we could set up a portkey by which we could go back and finish that duel."

"Is it settled then?" asked the witch.

"I think so. You know, Malfoy, sometimes we can make one heck of a team."

 _-line break-_

 **A/N: Reviews are always appreciated and cherished, and hope you enjoyed!**


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